


The Game

by eos_3



Series: Stained Lips, Sealed Tongue - 30 Kisses Sakura/Sai [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: 30 Kisses Challenge, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Awkward Romance, F/M, Mild Femdom, Military Promotion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-08-16
Updated: 2009-08-16
Packaged: 2018-03-03 04:24:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2837846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eos_3/pseuds/eos_3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sakura surprises Sai with more than just evidence of her recent promotion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Game

**Author's Note:**

> 30 Kisses Prompt #2 - News; Letter

Sai looked up from his sketchbook, as a familiar shadow fell across his back and cut across the page.

"Wanna see what I've got?," Sakura said, grinning like she'd caught some of whatever affliction it was that made Naruto smile all the time for no reason.

Lowering his brush half-heartedly, and glancing across the unmown field where he had been studying the movement of the wind through the grass, and the little finches that popped up from it every now and then, he gave her his attention. Sakura unrolled an ornate scroll and dangled the contents in front of him.

His eyes widened. "You made Jounin," he said.

All the requisite seals decorated the lower half of the document. The Hokage, the Daimyo, the village council, and three other experienced Jounin - including that of one Hatake Kakashi - all of them had vouched for her abilities.

"Are you that surprised?" Sakura's face fell a little, and his heart galloped, while he tried to form words that could possibly describe another emotion that had unearthed itself unexpected and raw in front of him.

He shook his head, looking up at her with a small, careful smile. "I've got an odd feeling. I'm not surprised though," he said.

Her eyebrow quirked up, as she came around from behind him to sit next to him on the grass. "An odd feeling? Like what?"

"In my chest. It spreads out from the middle. A warm feeling - and it's not indigestion."

Sakura smiled and laughed. "Are you proud of me?"

"Maybe. Not as much as Kakashi, I'm sure." He pointed at the henohenomoheji drawn under Kakashi's seal. "I doubt Naruto will get that on his, even if he ever makes Jounin."

"The only reason he isn't, is that he screws up the paperwork every time he applies," Sakura said, her eyes lingering on the silly little face in the midst of the other more weighty signets as she rolled up the scroll.

"I suppose having the capacity to navigate red tape is as much of a skill as anything else a shinobi could be tested on. Though he seems to have a special ability to get around such formalities most of the time," he said, touching his brush to the paper again.

Sakura sighed. "I don't think Tsunade's going to crack on this. If he wants to be Hokage someday, he's going to have to play the game."

"Game?"

"You know, the one where you do things to make other people happy so they'll do things to make you happy," she explained. "Diplomacy, compromise, manipulation. Naruto's not really good at any one of those things."

That sounded familiar. He knew what the words meant, but as usual the context baffled him. "Oh. It sounds a little like when I have to guess what I did to make you angry."

Sakura taught him a great deal through trial and error, sometimes with painful results; he could handle pain easier than the confusion that interpersonal relations outside of Root presented him with. Fortunately, for the sake of what Sakura seemed to think of as his extremely punchable face, the longer they knew each other, the more often Sakura gave him the opportunity to explain himself. He should have kissed her sooner.

Laughing, she leaned against his shoulder, her vivid pink hair brushing his cheek

.

"Almost. Mmm - there's another game we can play right now, one that would make me very happy," Sakura said, tucking the scroll back into her pouch as she pushed his sketchbook down, until it lay flat against his legs.

Sai went through his mental list of things that he knew pleased her and could apply to this situation. His cheeks reddened and he licked his lips and set his work aside. If he didn't move fast she'd have him on his back in the grass, and he'd have to wrestle her if he wanted to take the dominant position and 'win'. Though in these sort of intimate moments, there was never really a winner or a loser.

They both moved at the same time, but she had better leverage, managing to push him back and straddle him all in one smooth movement, knocking his breath out. "Say to me 'Congratulations, Sakura-sempai.'"

He looked up at her grinning face, his eyes narrowed almost to slits. Sempai indeed. He was two years older than she, and had been out slitting throats for Danzou, before Sakura even learned to throw a kunai straight. Yet, somehow, she reached Jounin rank first. He couldn't say that she didn't earn it.

"Congratulations, Sakura-sempai," he said, his voice low and soft. "I'm going to kiss you now."


End file.
